The Goldfinch: Truth in Art and Life
Carel Fabritius, The Goldfinch, 1654 "We have art in order to not die for the truth." Donna Tartt quotes Nietzche in the opening of one of her chapters in The Goldfinch , an epic journey of life novel. It's taken me all year, but finally, I've finished reading The Goldfinch ( need a long plane trip to do that ). The entire drama is centered around a missing painting, or, shall we say, a stolen painting in the hands of the narrator. It's interesting that Donna Tartt chose a painting to be the symbol of her protagonist. I always enjoy reading books that center around a painting. Usually these books imagine the fictions that influenced the creation of the paintings, books by Sarah Dunant ( In the Company of the Courtesan ) and Tracy Chevalier ( Girl with a Pearl Earring ). But this novel is not about how or why the painting was made. It is about the journey of the painting and it's presumed caretaker, what it does for him through his growing years and into